Silvio Berlusconi, the former Prime Minister of Italy, known as “the immortal” for his longevity in politics, left a hospital in Milan on Friday after spending six weeks there due to leukemia and a lung infection.
Berlusconi, 86 years old, got into a car with tinted windows around noon after leaving San Raffaele Hospital in Milan, the capital of Lombardy, where he had been admitted on April 5, according to an AFP photographer at the scene.
He had entered the prestigious hospital to treat issues related to a lung infection, but his doctors revealed that he was also suffering from chronic leukemia.
In May, he addressed his supporters in a video message from his hospital room, sitting behind a desk with his party’s banner and the Italian flag behind him.
Having dominated Italian politics for decades, Berlusconi has appeared physically diminished in his rare public appearances.
He is considered one of the wealthiest men in Italy, with a fortune estimated by Forbes at 6.4 billion euros (around 6.9 billion dollars).
In recent years, he has been hospitalized multiple times. In January 2022, he was admitted to San Raffaele for a urinary infection, and a few months earlier, he spent over three weeks in the hospital due to “COVID-19 aftermath,” contracted in September 2020.
In 1997, he underwent surgery for a malignant prostate tumor, had open-heart surgery in 2016, and underwent an intervention in 2019 to treat an intestinal obstruction.
Scandals have been intertwined with Berlusconi’s trajectory, and his political demise has been announced many times, only to see him return. His story is closely intertwined with Italy’s history over the past 30 years.
He served as Prime Minister three times between 1994 and 2011 and is currently a senator and the president of his right-wing party, Forza Italia, a minor partner in Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s coalition government.
Meloni visited him in the hospital on Sunday, stating that he was in “excellent spirits” and continuing to work “tirelessly.” “We await you on the field to fight our battles together,” said the far-right leader on Friday.
Antonio Tajani, the number two of Forza Italia and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, along with Matteo Salvini, the leader of the anti-immigration League party and a coalition ally, also visited him.
“Welcome home, great Silvio,” tweeted Matteo Salvini on Friday. “We are all happy for your return home; welcome back, President,” wrote Tajani.
A football enthusiast, Silvio Berlusconi presided over AC Milan for 31 years, during which the team won the UEFA Champions League five times. He then sold the club in April 2017 to Chinese investors and currently owns Monza.
His career has also been marked by scandals and legal troubles, which in the past decade focused on his infamous “Bunga Bunga” sex parties.
The octogenarian, whose partner Marta Fascina is 53 years younger than him, caused another scandal in December 2022 when he promised his players “a busload of prostitutes” in the locker room in case of victory before a match.
His pro-Russian statements, as a media mogul and a friend of Vladimir Putin, also put Giorgia Meloni in a difficult position. She served as his Minister of Youth from 2008 to 2011.
But for millions of Italians, he represents the golden age of the Italian economy. His family’s holding company, Fininvest, includes television channels (MediaForEurope), newspapers, and Mondadori editions.